Monday and Tuesday I went to Malaga (Spain) with my wife, to meet some customers.

On Monday, as soon as we landed, we went to the hotel to drop our luggage, so I could go meet my customers.

This time we stayed at the Gran Hotel Miramar, the former Palace of Justice, a grand building on the Malagueta beach. Newly renovated, it’s very ample, modern, and has achieved a unique style mixing classical Moorish decor with contemporary design.

While I went to work, my wife went to the Picasso Museum, as I have visited that museum many times before. The meeting with my customers went well, and it did not take the whole day, so I met my wife at the Centre Pompidou (the only outlet of this cultural icon outside Paris). Inaugurated 3 years ago, I can’t believe it has taken me this long to visit. Although, to be honest, I expected more. More works, more interesting selection, and a better layout. But worth the visit anyway. We even bought some books in the store.

As we walked back to the hotel, we chose to dip our feet in the water, on the Malagueta beach. I never loved that beach, with coarse dark sand and broken shells. The water was quite cold. But it was such a relief to escape the day’s heat, that we did not mind at all.

For dinner, as we were very tired, after some online research and a recommendation from the hotel’s concierge, we went to Aire GastroBar, right next to the hotel. Quite an amazing place! We chose to try many of their innovative tapas appetizers, instead of a couple of main dishes. Definitely the right call. Everything was delicious and fun.

The next day we had a few hours before going to the train station, so after sleeping in (finally, long overdue) we made it to the breakfast buffet right before they closed, and then we ventured in to town with one objective: to visit the Malaga Center for Contemporary Art CAC and the Carmen Thyssen Museum. As usual, the CAC did not disappoint. They have some of the best curators anywhere and always present very interesting works.

The Carmen Thyssen Museum is just a fancy and very professional display of part of the amazing Thyssen art collection. Their Madrid museum is a lot more interesting and varied, but this visit served as a sort of Spanish painting art history tour for my wife.

Before heading off to the train station to take the high-speed train to Valencia, we stopped at my favorite tea shop: La Tetería, where we got some yummies to go, like cardamom and rose water lassi, fruit-kale-ginger smoothie, a couple of subs (one with porcini mushrooms and melted brie cheese), and an amazing carrot cake.